This programme is designed to meet the need for critically focused advanced-level study for established art and design teachers* within the contexts of professional in-career development and life-long learning; extend teachers’ learning in areas of creative art and design practice, research and teaching. It is a blended programme, meaning some of the programme is face-to-face, some distance. The extent of the face-to-face contact is small, though crucial, amounting to seminars and workshops held during eight days over the two years. The programme makes learning experiences available to teachers that take advantage of online platforms to network with peers and agencies for the advancement of professional skills, personal capabilities and educational innovation and change in the field of art and design, and to provide teachers with pioneering learning and teaching processes that place a premium on contribution, collaboration, responsibility and autonomy.

The programme functions on the basis of forming an online community of practice and it is organised around seven learning activities. Broadly speaking, these activities are concerned with three areas:

evisiting one’s art/design creative practice (making work)

networking with peers within the community of practice to develop new skills and ideas in the field of art and design education

conceiving and promoting innovative approaches to art and design curriculum in the context of one’s teaching/educational work.

Therefore, being a participant of the programme would involve you getting back into the studio, so to speak, getting online and collaborating with other art teachers and tutors, and getting involved in trying out new ideas in the art room and other settings. An important aspect of the programme is to integrate different facets of one’s personal and professional life, developing oneself as an ARTIST/DESIGNER RESEARCHER TEACHER

*Please note this programme is not an Initial Teacher Education programme, please refer to the Professional Master of Education in Art and Design with Digital Media if you are interested in becoming an art and design teacher.

GEL - Areas of focus are the social and situated nature of learning and self-study as a form of professional practice. What it means to be an artist-teacher is examined. Attention is placed on group discussion, posts and threads and setting personal standards for self-regulation and management of learning and inquiry in cooperation with peers. Use is made of Community Walk to aid mutual awareness.

MULL - Attention shifts to the learner's identity as an artist/designer to current and/or past practice. Methods include autobiographical tracing or mapping of one's identity as an artist/designer. The activity involves presentation in an online environment using a range of media possibilities, such as uploading photographs and video to a personal blog or creating links to sites featuring the work of artists and designers. Emphasis is placed on collaboration to identify personal and common art world preferences, and ad hoc collectives are established for the exchange of ideas and show work.

VET - This activity concerns openness and receptivity to contemporary art and design; ideas, forms and situations. Learners interrogate and conceptualise forms that most interest them. It involves examining local, national and international exhibitions and cultural events. Attention is given to modernist and postmodern paradigms. The activity involves searching and tagging, acting in the role of a critic and negotiating discourses within the community of practice.

REV - One area is dealt with in this activity: creative practice. Building on prior experience, this is a sustained period of art/design making. Being inquiry minded is central as is fostering relations within the community of practice, especially in the context of mutual supports and encouragement, and offsetting isolation.

COP - Two main areas are dealt with. One, contemporary concepts of art and design education, and two, teacher research to develop a deeper understating of learning, teaching, curriculum and school/community contexts. The research is framed by the learner's own contexts and questions. Emphasis is placed on diverse methods to capture the work of an art department and the teaching-learning culture, and on the ongoing sharing of findings with the group.

BUZZ - This activity is concerned with curriculum innovation and teacher research and the integration of art/design practice, theory and education. Emphasis is placed on critical pedagogy, living inquiry, transformation, change agency and creating reform orientated resources within a collaborative group.

NET - This activity is about networking and linking, explaining and promoting the mutual aims and work of one's art department and some outside cultural agency via a linked blog or website. Emphasis is placed on approaches to online communication and peer collaborations based on geographical location.